


there are visions, there are memories. there are fires, there is laughter.

by sultrygoblin



Category: Dead Poets Society (1989)
Genre: Adult Romance, Angst, Coming of Age, Eventual Smut, F/M, Fluff, Grief/Mourning, Growing Up, Implied/Referenced Suicide, No Underage Sex, Past and Present, Romance, School Reunion, Teen Romance, future knox/reader, past neil/reader
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-11
Updated: 2020-11-11
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:48:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27505612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sultrygoblin/pseuds/sultrygoblin
Summary: series - neil perry x reader |find the answers, ask the questions. find the roots of an ancient tree. take me dancing, take me singing. i'll ride on till the moon meets the sea| knox overstreet x reader
Relationships: Charlie Dalton/Original Female Character(s), Neil Perry (Dead Poets Society)/Reader, knox overstreet/reader
Kudos: 6





	there are visions, there are memories. there are fires, there is laughter.

**Author's Note:**

> same afab reader. follows cannon as best something like this can. i don’t want to mix past and present all the time or too much (i know that can be kind of annoying) but it’s needed for this. sorry.

It’s strange to you that today it wouldn’t rain. It had seemed to rain every other important day of your life. This should be one of those. But no matter how the grey clouds swelled, the thunder boomed and lightning crashed, not a drop. It seemed to have decided it would be just another thing to hang heavily in the air since the moment you’d stepped off the train. Something you shouldn’t have done in the first place. A smart woman would be halfway across the world but you’d never been a smart woman, no matter what anyone else liked to think. You had continued to prove this trait by climbing into a taxi and making a not completely unfamiliar drive to a building that still haunted your best dreams and most terrible nightmares. The man asks you polite questions but eventually falls into talking about himself. You would roll your eyes, internally lamenting how even in this day and age men still thought all women truly longed to hear was stories they told but your eyes were focused outside the window, surprised at how suddenly the wall you had spent an entire adulthood building up had come crumbling down at the barest sights of the grounds.

  


* * *

“You’ll be alright, darling,” your mother cooed, pressing your hair back behind your ear with that smile she painted on when your grandparents came to visit, “You’ll be fine.”

“It’s not me I’m worried about,” flicking your eyes towards your brother and the brow beating he must be receiving from your father about looking after you, “He does understand we’re the same age, doesn’t he?”

“Your father may be progressive but you are one of handful of girls-” pinching your chin between her fingers when you began to roll your eyes, “This is important. Your friends, _you,_ could change an entire administration. And your father is far too busy worrying about the wrong set of hormones,” this time you did manage to roll your eyes and where normally you would return to find a smirk there was only the piercing gaze of the woman you were lucky enough to call mother, “Promise me.”

“You’re being ridi-”

“ _Promise me!”_ this drew straight stares from the few boys milling around pretending not to look, “I will put you in that car myself-”

“I’ll promise if you hush up about it,” darting your eyes back and forth in battered down embarrassment, “I’ll be on my best behavior.”

“That’s precisely what worries me, darling,” loosening her grip to hold your cheeks in her hands, “You know this will be the longest we’ve ever been apart? I don’t know how I’ll cope without you.”

“Well, there will be far less to do without having to clean up after me,” you leaned forward, pressing a kiss to her cheek, “I’ll call. I’ll write. But the staring is only bound to get worse. I’d like to not be sick of it already.”

“Perhaps if you’re sick of it you’ll be- Yes, I see you, my love but waving harder will not make me finish any faster,” returning your kiss with one of her own that’s sure to have left a scarlet mark on your cheek.

“Go,” you step back, bending slightly to grab your bag, your trunk should already be waiting in the small converted dorms for you and the few other girls who’d managed to slip through a legal gap, “You can’t start missing me if you don’t leave, mother,” taking a step back as your father stepped around you with a light pat to your shoulder before taking your mom tightly by the bicep, “I’ll be fine.”

“It’s not you I’m worried about, darling, it’s everyone else,” she called over her shoulder as he began to drag her to the car, knowing full if he didn’t now everyone would have to stand here for a full hour. 

  


“Did your husband go to Welton?” this time you do roll your eyes.

At least it isn’t audibly, something you had often been accused of, “Yes,” that faux sweetness you’d learned so well from your mother falls from your tongue, “He went on ahead for the reunion.”

It’s easier than the truth, and it sets him on another tangent. Something about having gone to the local high school. That would’ve been before your time. Not that you had been given much of it to spend in the wonderful New England country side that had felt like home for the first time when your parents had driven you there for the first time, alongside your grumbling twin. Perhaps that’s what hurt the most. This had been home. So many beautiful things had happened here but the few awful memories had done their best to taint the rest. No matter how fondly you tried to look back there would always be that inky black spot that made your heartache and eyes threaten to swell with tears. 

  


If your brother were a good one he might’ve stuck around to help you find your room. But his kindness had never extended beyond the presence of your mother and father. How utterly lost you now found yourself was proof enough of that. You would think that being in a courtyard would make things easier, but each archway seemed to lead to the exact same way out. And there was no hope in seeing the correct building over the towering stone wall. 

“Well, look at that Todd, you just might be lucky,” comes a voice that you can tell is smiling before the two boys ever make into your view.

And what a view it is. Shining brown eyes that make any promise you made to your mother fly out the window and the smile that accompanied them made sure they would stay out. You’ve never much liked blazers and ties on boys but it looks stylish on his frame. You’re quite glad he’s focused on his blonde compatriot who’s trying to stutter out words to notice you looking too long. At least, you hope that’s the case because much like him you’re stumbling over your words, thankful in your mind, when he turns his full attention on you.

“It’s really quite cruel of them to let you fend for yourself like this,” he laughs, taking a step forward and offering his hand, “Neil Perry. Todd Anderson,” pointing behind him when you shake his hand, something you’re sure not to forget anytime soon, “We all know who you are,” which is enough to send blood rushing to your cheeks you’re prepared to cross your fingers in hopes of him not noticing. 

“Well, I had a brother. But you’ve seen what good one of those is,” releasing his hand before switching your bag to that hand, if only to relieve the urge to fidget, “You would think a rectory would be easy to find-”

“You would be wrong,” taking another step to stand beside you and pointing down the path to your left, “You’ll take that, go three buildings buildings, you’ll swing a left, and it should be straight ahead.”

“I guess I’ve run out of excuses then?” laughing lightly as your other hand smoothed down the side of your unfashionably baby blue uniform skirt, “Hopefully I’ll see you around, Neil Perry.”

You manage to force back an instinctive smirk when his cheeks tint pink, his friend coughing a bit awkwardly, “You most certainly will.”

It isn’t a long walk and it let’s your mind run through the short series of events second by second. Your mother had made you promise to be on your best behavior but as far as your father was concerned finding an eligible young man was your best behavior. To the extent that it had been your own farewell speech while your mother was no doubt giving your brother the smarter explanation of keeping you away from distraction and distraction away from you. While he was explaining once this all went belly up you’d have met many young men from good families and he expected you to return winter break with at least one family to set a dinner with. 

Except you knew money, you had been around it your whole life. Neil’s scuffed shoes would have been long disposed of in your own household and there’s stitching where his blazer has been brought back together. Expertly so but had it been your brother’s, it would have already been replaced. Something about that endeared him even more to your sensibility it seems. _Only you_ , mother’s voice echoing in your head when you make your way through the front door, up the stairs, and past the 9 other girls who’d arrived with you to find your own room. On your left is Mallory Fig, she was in the year above you at school and had a nasty habit of leading your brother on. You had once cared but found very quickly he walked himself into that trap over and over ago. No doubt their inevitable engagement and her father’s ability to write a large check had explained her appearance. As well as her never ending need to not be outdone be you.

To the right was a girl who looked about your age, beret off kilter on her head with a book on her knees and an apple in her hand. She looked up when you stopped, working your key into the door, slurping the juice off her lips and shooting you a wave. You give her your own smile and push the old door open, finding a bare room with your trunk, a well made bed with a standard bed set, a three drawer dresser, and a desk. You sighed, thankful you had over-packed on knick knacks when you drop your bag just inside the door. The girl materializes beside you.

“Eliza,” she steps into you room and holds up a pack of smokes with a raised eyebrow, “The rest of these girls are such a bore,” a French lilt in her voice that inevitably piques your interest.

With a quick introduction, you watch her open the window and sit on the sill, “Most of them don’t expect this to last the semester,” you explain plainly sitting next to her and taking the offered tobacco, “They’ll spend the time proving to every one why women shouldn’t be allowed and prance off with prospects galore,” disgusting dripping from every word as you rolled your eyes.

“They’re stories will end here,” nudging you lightly with her knee and a smile, “I think this is where yours starts.”

  


She looks different standing outside the school, waiting as the taxi comes to a slow stop. Baby bump under the front of her always stylish dress, that big diamond ring on her left hand and Charlie’s grip in her right. He’s getting your small suitcase out of the trunk before the cabbie can even open his door, you happily pay, leaving a nice tip at his efforts to do what it was in his profession to do. You’re far too excited, enveloping the woman in a tight hug as you received a bright red kiss on your cheek reminding very much of how your mother’s had been. 

“You look beautiful,” she cooed, gripping your bicep and looking at her husband, “Doesn’t she look gorgeous, _amore_?”

You roll your eyes, turning to wrap you arms around his waist while he rubs your back with is free hand, “Just like I remember.”

“I see you’ve decided to curse the world with the unholy spawn of you both,” slowly making your way towards the door with your best friend as Charlie made the quick run to put your case in the back of their car, “Tell me, can you even walk inside a church with that hellion in your stomach?” dropping your head on her shoulder as she wrapped it around your waist.

“I’ve been fine so far,” she laughs, leading you towards the dining hall where the early arrives had begun to gather, “Though I swear, he kicks as if somehow that would let him out faster.”

“I wonder where she learned to be so incessantly aggressive,” he materializes, stealing your friend away to wrap his arms around her waist, chin on her shoulder, “Unfortunately, I think she’s going to be just as adorable as her mother. And so the chain continues ever on.”

Eliza rolls her eyes but watching the two of them your heart swells. At first it had felt much like knocking together coconuts but by the time you had been forced from these hallowed halls not too far behind the man himself a bond had formed between the two. If ever two people had defied expectations, it had been them. But it feels right, just like it had standing beside her at their wedding, and on the other end of the phone when she was still trying to comprehend the late periods and what they meant.

“The others?” you ask, looking at him hopefully.

He shrugs, shaking his head, “I’m sorry, doll.”

“I don’t know why I asked,” forcing flippancy and shaking your head lightly, “Drinks?”

Scotch for the gentleman, a sweet white wine for the lady, and you thought it might be best to join your long time friend. You already felt like you would lose your footing any second. You hadn’t imagined how intense it would feel, every memory trying to force it’s way through. And you can’t. Not yet. Because even if you smile, at some point you will have to cry. You’re hoping the ground burn taking over your throat will do the trick, sipping while the bartender searches for a _sweet_ white wine after you make clear that Eliza’s wrath is not one he wants to be on the other end of if the one glass she allows herself is incorrect.

“Only one person I know who can make a pointed order sound like a sweet request,” an almost familiar voice comes from behind you.

“Knox Overstreet,” spinning with a smile that dares to falter, “Wow.”

“I was about to say the same thing,” he laughs, wrapping his arm softly around your bicep, his hand warm through the sheer overlay, “Nuwanda warned me you were even more beautiful than we remembered.”

You shook her head, “It’s hard to tell if you’re all being genuine or just trying to make me feel better,” feeling your cheeks grow warm, feeling something awfully familiar in the pit of your stomach.

“I’ve always been a big fan of both when it comes to you,” gesturing to your drink when the man returned with a wine glass and a hopeful smile, “Mind if I join you guys? Fourth wheel and all.”

“There’s the Knox I know,” his hand dropping to grab his drink as well as the wine glass, heading back towards the couple, “Always coming to my rescue”

  


Every one is making their way towards the dining hall, which makes it especially hard to find the object of your interest while avoiding all the eyes that stare at the group of you. You might never have found him if you hadn’t collided with a completely different boy. He almost hits the floor, apologizing intensely with an awkward, crooked smile. You take the blame quickly, wanting to get back to your task and realizing not a moment too late that this boy might be your answer.

“You wouldn’t happen to know Neil Perry?” you ask, on the off chance he really does and you can avoid the rumor mill stirring already.

He pauses at the question, as if he wasn’t sure you had said what you actually said before nodding, “Yeah. Yeah, I do.”

You hope your eyes do widen as much as you feel like they do, pressing forward in the crowd along side him with a smile, “You guys sit together then, right?” he nodded, you sigh audibly, reaching into the fold of your skirt and pulling out a tightly folded piece of paper, “Could you give him this for me?”

“How do you know, Neil?” both of you can already feel the crowd whispering around the both of you, and you’re both desperate to get out of the spotlight.

You shake your head, turning your head and happy to find Eliza not to much deeper into the crowd, “He’ll know. I really appreciate this...” trailing off.

“Knox. Knox Overstreet,” you grin, patting his arm before ducking beneath the arm of two fighting boys in front of you.

It isn’t hard to get to her once you figure out the flow of traffic and that bubble seems to exist around you and the other girls does the rest of the work. All of you eat at a table assigned to you, already splitting into the small groups you would no doubt keep for your unforeseeable future here. It isn’t surprising to see Mallory glaring down the table with the rest of the older girls, the four younger girls having clumped themselves together out of sheer necessity. You and Eliza are perfectly content in your corner. Peering around the room until you had found the table you were looking for. On the opposite side of the room, towards the middle, the second seat down face almost directly at you. You smile when you finally reach his eye, truly not expecting you would have managed it and then dipping your head.

“You have a crush already?” she asks a laugh in her voice that is sweet instead of the cruel you’re used from the other girls you know, “I knew you would be a romantic.”

“And what are you?” you ask, watching out the corner of your eye when he leans back, accepting what could only be your note from Mr. Knox Overstreet before the lunch monitor turned to make his round back. 

She shrugs, “I’m not sure yet. But one day I’ll find out,” tapping your arm comfortingly and gesturing with her eyes at the boy you had found yourself far too quickly enamored with, “You should enjoy being able to feel so much, so soon. My father always says it destines people like you for greatness.”

He tucks it in his front pocket, one of the other boys leaning to see around him before tapping him on the chest with the back of his knuckles, and saying something you assume congratulatory, “I’d settle for freedom.”

Eliza laughs, “I told you; greatness,” dropping her spoon in the mush they had called potatoes on her tray, “You suppose he’ll introduce me to one of his friends. It seems a shame to do so much work when you’ve already got your foot in a door.”

You smile, tapping her foot with yours under the table, “I don’t think I should tell my mother about you. You are everything she’s warning me about.”

“Yourself?” you roll your eyes, joining her in abandoning the creamless pile of starch for the sweetened baked good, “I am being serious you know. There is some talent at that table.”

You don’t get to respond, the older man turns and starts barking orders at each and every one of you. It’s familiar and it at least let’s you wonder what happens next. For the moment you’re perfectly happy to trade another set of smiles across the forcefully silent room. 

**Author's Note:**

> chapter two; past or present? tell me here!


End file.
